Was 911 & the Cultural Aftermath/Change in National Mood Part of This Crisis Period?

[David Horn]

(09-23-2018, 08:55 AM)Marypoza Wrote: -- don't bet on it. Eric, those f-ing Dems are already moving 4ward to get Kavanaugh confirmed 

If this plays through, and the Dems let it happen, just to preserve their seats, then this gets ugly really fast.  Of course, the alternatives suck too.  Looking down the list, and assume one or more of the at-risk Dems or Pro-Choice Republicans grows a pair (or even one) and votes against then these are the possiblities:

1. Kavanaugh is approved but the GOP loses the Senate
   
2. Kavanaugh fails but the GOP retains the Senate
   
3. Kavanaugh is approved and the GOP retains the Senate anyway
   
4. Kavanaugh fails and the GOP loses the Senate.
   

I put them in the order of most to least likely. 1 is a push for the Dems, but may justify packing the Senate if they get that option. If they don't, then the court is RW for the foreseeable future. 2 is a push in the other direction, but may convince DJT not to fire everyone in sight. Of the four options, this is the one I have the least sense of where it leads. 3 is bad all the way; DJT fires everyone including Mueller. Nothing good comes of this. 4 is highly unlikely, but it's dicey. If the Dems get too high on their own juices, it can be WJC all over again … including the possibility of a second term for the Orange One.

[Eric the Green]

(09-23-2018, 08:55 AM)Marypoza Wrote:

(07-20-2018, 11:49 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(06-27-2018, 01:53 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(06-26-2018, 07:33 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: The idea that the US-Vietnam War, the Pentagon Papers about it, or Watergate as its domestic reflection, have left no impact on younger people, is saying that younger people do not know any history today. That's possible, but it's also true that "when you lower the bar, it tends to stay down barring a major effort to raise it back to its former place" "with nothing having been done to offset the negative effects". Many young people also have parents were were involved or injured by the war in some way or involved in the protests against it, so this is one reason it may still be an influential source of today's attitudes. 

The best logical conclusion of such a level of distrust in the government, is that the government is substantially changed or overthrown. That is what the sixties radicals proposed all along. The younger generations will now be the power behind this possible logical outcome. This 4T, to be fulfilled, must be a revolution.

Symbolically, this is echoed in the cycles of our planets in 2022 by the first-ever Pluto Return to its place in 1776 since King George was taken down as ruler of America.

But a violent revolution by the left against the state is a likely fail. A movement that results in dynamic and substantial change through revitalized elections is more likely, and demographic shifts seem to support it despite the efforts of the current so-called president and the Supreme Court to stem the tide. The violence then would come from the right, as it did in the civil war. And it should be more-easily suppressed this time...

I agree that a violent revolution is out.  It won't work -- not today, at least.  So that leaves the slow, messy political process, which has been purposely gummed-up by the GOP.  To get anywhere from here, we need at least 2 election cycles to get enough change in the Senate to prevent yet more loses in the SCOTUS (Note: Anthony Kennedy just waved-out, so Trump gets two appointments at least).  Assuming that the progressive wing of the Dems is able to win big in 2020 and move things along, having a majority in both Houses of Congress and the Presidency, the way is still blocked by a right-wing court.

Reapportionment happens in 2021, so the 2022 elections will have newly drawn districts, but the GOP will still have the courts to block the new maps (this is based on the already obvious extremes the court is willing to go to keep things Republican and the relative youth of the conservative members of the court).  Can the Dems do today what FDR could not in 1937 and add a few additional seats to the SCOTUS?  Unlikely.  

So we march out of the 4T having achieved a stalemate at best.

It seems so. I am not wearing my rose colored glasses. And yet the real 4T years are still ahead, so there's no telling how far things will go, or how dynamic the emerging Democratic majority could be, if it happens. They could pack the Court, if there's no other option for a dynamic 4T that makes changes. A 4T in which we march out of it in stalemate has never happened yet. The Democrats could even take over the Senate in this year's elections, since 4 Republican seats are vulnerable (NV AZ TN TX). That means Trump supreme court nominees could be blocked.

-- don't bet on it. Eric, those f-ing Dems are already moving 4ward to get Kavanaugh confirmed 

Most Democrats are good, and will vote against him, just as they did against Gorsuch. Kavanaugh will not do as well. If he gets confirmed, it will be the two moderate Republican women, and/or one or more conservative Democrats like Manchin from deep red states, who vote him in. 

You CAN'T condemn the Democrats for this. Our system makes it very difficult and extremely rare to have a genuine Democratic majority in the Senate. The USA election and congressional system was set up deliberately to keep the slave states in the union. It still works that way. Democrats can't get a majority, much less a filibuster-proof one, without winning in small rural and other deep red states. As long as we have states with people who remain hooked on the Republican ideologies, and who don't yet see that these ideologies are false, we are stuck.

[Eric the Green]

(09-23-2018, 03:31 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(09-23-2018, 08:55 AM)Marypoza Wrote: -- don't bet on it. Eric, those f-ing Dems are already moving 4ward to get Kavanaugh confirmed 

If this plays through, and the Dems let it happen, just to preserve their seats, then this gets ugly really fast.  Of course, the alternatives suck too.  Looking down the list, and assume one or more of the at-risk Dems or Pro-Choice Republicans grows a pair (or even one) and votes against then these are the possiblities:

1. Kavanaugh is approved but the GOP loses the Senate
   
2. Kavanaugh fails but the GOP retains the Senate
   
3. Kavanaugh is approved and the GOP retains the Senate anyway
   
4. Kavanaugh fails and the GOP loses the Senate.
   

I put them in the order of most to least likely.  1 is a push for the Dems, but may justify packing the Senate if they get that option.  If they don't, then the court is RW for the foreseeable future.  2 is a push in the other direction, but may convince DJT not to fire everyone in sight.  Of the four options, this is the one I have the least sense of where it leads.  3 is bad all the way; DJT fires everyone including Mueller.  Nothing good comes of this.  4 is highly unlikely, but it's dicey.  If the Dems get too high on their own juices, it can be WJC all over again … including the possibility of a second term for the Orange One.

One thing that might happen, is that Trump withdraws Kavanaugh. It doesn't seem to matter how lavishly he praises someone; it (s)he fails him in some way, whether (s)he fails in some way in the job, or fails to support him enough personally, Trump is usually willing to fire or drop that person. 

But he may still have time to nominate another candidate and get him or her approved, even in a lame duck session after which the Democrats take over, or before Jan.3 in any case. As of now, it's uncertain that the Democrats can take it over. Even if they do, and more options for blocking Trump will thereby happen, he would still when some Senate votes because the Democrats will still include some from red states.

[Marypoza]

(09-24-2018, 03:59 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(09-23-2018, 08:55 AM)Marypoza Wrote:

(07-20-2018, 11:49 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(06-27-2018, 01:53 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(06-26-2018, 07:33 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: The idea that the US-Vietnam War, the Pentagon Papers about it, or Watergate as its domestic reflection, have left no impact on younger people, is saying that younger people do not know any history today. That's possible, but it's also true that "when you lower the bar, it tends to stay down barring a major effort to raise it back to its former place" "with nothing having been done to offset the negative effects". Many young people also have parents were were involved or injured by the war in some way or involved in the protests against it, so this is one reason it may still be an influential source of today's attitudes. 

The best logical conclusion of such a level of distrust in the government, is that the government is substantially changed or overthrown. That is what the sixties radicals proposed all along. The younger generations will now be the power behind this possible logical outcome. This 4T, to be fulfilled, must be a revolution.

Symbolically, this is echoed in the cycles of our planets in 2022 by the first-ever Pluto Return to its place in 1776 since King George was taken down as ruler of America.

But a violent revolution by the left against the state is a likely fail. A movement that results in dynamic and substantial change through revitalized elections is more likely, and demographic shifts seem to support it despite the efforts of the current so-called president and the Supreme Court to stem the tide. The violence then would come from the right, as it did in the civil war. And it should be more-easily suppressed this time...

I agree that a violent revolution is out.  It won't work -- not today, at least.  So that leaves the slow, messy political process, which has been purposely gummed-up by the GOP.  To get anywhere from here, we need at least 2 election cycles to get enough change in the Senate to prevent yet more loses in the SCOTUS (Note: Anthony Kennedy just waved-out, so Trump gets two appointments at least).  Assuming that the progressive wing of the Dems is able to win big in 2020 and move things along, having a majority in both Houses of Congress and the Presidency, the way is still blocked by a right-wing court.

Reapportionment happens in 2021, so the 2022 elections will have newly drawn districts, but the GOP will still have the courts to block the new maps (this is based on the already obvious extremes the court is willing to go to keep things Republican and the relative youth of the conservative members of the court).  Can the Dems do today what FDR could not in 1937 and add a few additional seats to the SCOTUS?  Unlikely.  

So we march out of the 4T having achieved a stalemate at best.

It seems so. I am not wearing my rose colored glasses. And yet the real 4T years are still ahead, so there's no telling how far things will go, or how dynamic the emerging Democratic majority could be, if it happens. They could pack the Court, if there's no other option for a dynamic 4T that makes changes. A 4T in which we march out of it in stalemate has never happened yet. The Democrats could even take over the Senate in this year's elections, since 4 Republican seats are vulnerable (NV AZ TN TX). That means Trump supreme court nominees could be blocked.

-- don't bet on it. Eric, those f-ing Dems are already moving 4ward to get Kavanaugh confirmed 

Most Democrats are good, and will vote against him, just as they did against Gorsuch. Kavanaugh will not do as well. If he gets confirmed, it will be the two moderate Republican women, and/or one or more conservative Democrats like Manchin from deep red states, who vote him in. 

You CAN'T condemn the Democrats for this. Our system makes it very difficult and extremely rare to have a genuine Democratic majority in the Senate. The USA election and congressional system was set up deliberately to keep the slave states in the union. It still works that way. Democrats can't get a majority, much less a filibuster-proof one, without winning in small rural and other deep red states. As long as we have states with people who remain hooked on the Republican ideologies, and who don't yet see that these ideologies are false, we are stuck.

-- actually Eric, thd Dems l was thinking of are Pelosi & Shumer

[pbrower2a]

We can't win the wingnuts back to us. We can't deport them. We can't deprogram them.

All that we can do is to hope that they can die off while we still have some life, or that they become irrelevant.

This is a 4T, and the people in charge have scorpions in their souls. We still have a democratic process. We still have rational processes for disposing of the intellectual chaff. Most Americans are far better than Donald Trump... we may have to do some searching in unlikely places, but we won't have to look far to find political allies.

We might as well accept that capitalism, bureaucratic structures, and Big Government are not going away. We can and must humanize those if we are to find any happiness other than the destructive binge.

[Eric the Green]

(09-24-2018, 04:59 AM)Marypoza Wrote:

(09-24-2018, 03:59 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(09-23-2018, 08:55 AM)Marypoza Wrote:

(07-20-2018, 11:49 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(06-27-2018, 01:53 PM)David Horn Wrote: I agree that a violent revolution is out.  It won't work -- not today, at least.  So that leaves the slow, messy political process, which has been purposely gummed-up by the GOP.  To get anywhere from here, we need at least 2 election cycles to get enough change in the Senate to prevent yet more loses in the SCOTUS (Note: Anthony Kennedy just waved-out, so Trump gets two appointments at least).  Assuming that the progressive wing of the Dems is able to win big in 2020 and move things along, having a majority in both Houses of Congress and the Presidency, the way is still blocked by a right-wing court.

Reapportionment happens in 2021, so the 2022 elections will have newly drawn districts, but the GOP will still have the courts to block the new maps (this is based on the already obvious extremes the court is willing to go to keep things Republican and the relative youth of the conservative members of the court).  Can the Dems do today what FDR could not in 1937 and add a few additional seats to the SCOTUS?  Unlikely.  

So we march out of the 4T having achieved a stalemate at best.

It seems so. I am not wearing my rose colored glasses. And yet the real 4T years are still ahead, so there's no telling how far things will go, or how dynamic the emerging Democratic majority could be, if it happens. They could pack the Court, if there's no other option for a dynamic 4T that makes changes. A 4T in which we march out of it in stalemate has never happened yet. The Democrats could even take over the Senate in this year's elections, since 4 Republican seats are vulnerable (NV AZ TN TX). That means Trump supreme court nominees could be blocked.

-- don't bet on it. Eric, those f-ing Dems are already moving 4ward to get Kavanaugh confirmed 

Most Democrats are good, and will vote against him, just as they did against Gorsuch. Kavanaugh will not do as well. If he gets confirmed, it will be the two moderate Republican women, and/or one or more conservative Democrats like Manchin from deep red states, who vote him in. 

You CAN'T condemn the Democrats for this. Our system makes it very difficult and extremely rare to have a genuine Democratic majority in the Senate. The USA election and congressional system was set up deliberately to keep the slave states in the union. It still works that way. Democrats can't get a majority, much less a filibuster-proof one, without winning in small rural and other deep red states. As long as we have states with people who remain hooked on the Republican ideologies, and who don't yet see that these ideologies are false, we are stuck.

-- actually Eric, thd Dems l was thinking of are Pelosi & Shumer

They won't support Kavanaugh; Pelosi can't even vote on the matter.

The only possible Democratic votes Kavanaugh can get are from deep red states. Manchin is the most likely; others possible are Donnelly, Heitkamp, Jones, any Democratic Senators who voted for Gorsuch.

https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/cns...on-gorsuch

[pbrower2a]

(09-23-2018, 03:31 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(09-23-2018, 08:55 AM)Marypoza Wrote: -- don't bet on it. Eric, those f-ing Dems are already moving 4ward to get Kavanaugh confirmed 

If this plays through, and the Dems let it happen, just to preserve their seats, then this gets ugly really fast.  Of course, the alternatives suck too.  Looking down the list, and assume one or more of the at-risk Dems or Pro-Choice Republicans grows a pair (or even one) and votes against then these are the possiblities:

1. Kavanaugh is approved but the GOP loses the Senate
   
2. Kavanaugh fails but the GOP retains the Senate
   
3. Kavanaugh is approved and the GOP retains the Senate anyway
   
4. Kavanaugh fails and the GOP loses the Senate.
   

I put them in the order of most to least likely.  1 is a push for the Dems, but may justify packing the Senate if they get that option.  If they don't, then the court is RW for the foreseeable future.  2 is a push in the other direction, but may convince DJT not to fire everyone in sight.  Of the four options, this is the one I have the least sense of where it leads.  3 is bad all the way; DJT fires everyone including Mueller.  Nothing good comes of this.  4 is highly unlikely, but it's dicey.  If the Dems get too high on their own juices, it can be WJC all over again … including the possibility of a second term for the Orange One.

Republicans will sacrifice Kavanaugh in an effort to save their Senate majority. Their highest principle aside from class privilege is power. He is becoming too high a risk for them.

Character matters greatly in judges. More significantly, a jurist who shades legal interpretations in favor of one political boss for his favored leader sets a precedent for others. Trump is the only President who could have supported the nomination of someone like this because this President's moral value is that if he wants it it is good, and if he does not want it it is bad. That is typical for a despot -- and atypical for any prior President. Sure, they have almost always chosen to nominate people compatible with their political values (Reagan or Obama) or to create a balance fitting theirs (Nixon).

The damage may already be done, and the question is of who gets to be the 'dissident' and how that 'dissident' formulates a call for Kavanaugh to be removed from consideration. Control of the Senate is much in question; with a President who is at all popular the Republicans should be gaining seats in the Senate.

One consequence of a Kavanaugh withdrawal is that Trump would appoint some right-wing jurist who has some crazy idea about economic power having special rights -- like the right to avoid having to deal with unions, or the right of employers to control their workers' votes. One state legislature would be enough to create a USSC case should some state's resident dissent and challenge such a law and a USSC majority decide on behalf of employers. Welcome to one of those high-tech nightmare worlds, the sort of monstrosity that one saw on 1930's serials, in which high technology and a feudal social order meld to create a totalitarian state. Think about it -- your employer decides how you are to be represented.

The third is an unmitigated disaster for America, evidence that the President can have people around to shade the law as he sees fit. Trump wants a servile, and not an independent judiciary... as do all despots and tyrants.

The fourth is a sleazy trade, and in its own way a disaster. Republicans have a majority until the conservative jurist in probably worst health dies. But this sets up the opportunity for a left-wing demagogue to set up his own Justice who sacrifices judicial independence for
rushing his economic agenda. Bolivarianismo norteamericano?

Donald Trump is of course the real nightmare.

At this point I see Kavanaugh not deciding any part of the 2018 or 2020 Congressional or Senatorial elections.

[David Horn]

(09-24-2018, 04:12 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: One thing that might happen, is that Trump withdraws Kavanaugh. It doesn't seem to matter how lavishly he praises someone; it (s)he fails him in some way, whether (s)he fails in some way in the job, or fails to support him enough personally, Trump is usually willing to fire or drop that person. 

But he may still have time to nominate another candidate and get him or her approved, even in a lame duck session after which the Democrats take over, or before Jan.3 in any case. As of now, it's uncertain that the Democrats can take it over. Even if they do, and more options for blocking Trump will thereby happen, he would still when some Senate votes because the Democrats will still include some from red states.

Considering the recent accusation by a college classmate, this may happen.  I don't see Kavanaugh getting to the court unscathed.  If he does make it anyway, it will almost certainly trigger a court-packing movement.

[TheNomad]

This thread is not about judicial confirmations. I know because I made it. How quickly things of a higher nature get dragged into simple human rhetorical business.

[David Horn]

(09-24-2018, 09:43 PM)TheNomad Wrote: This thread is not about judicial confirmations.  I know because I made it.  How quickly things of a higher nature get dragged into simple human rhetorical business.

FWIW, 9/11 was a sideshow that GWB turned into a justification for war-without-end.  That isn't a 4T thing.  It is cynical though.

[Tuss]

(09-22-2018, 12:23 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(09-21-2018, 06:23 AM)Tuss Wrote:

(06-03-2018, 04:02 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(06-02-2018, 08:23 AM)TheNomad Wrote: Was 911 and the following affect on American culture along with the several wars after 911 and the change in national mood part of the Crisis portion of this saeculum we are now in?

If not, why?

No, because America turned back quickly to an Unraveling mood. The President told people to "travel" and "go shopping", much in contrast to the response to the Pearl Harbor attack. After "the Date that will live in Infamy", America quickly put an end to luxury production and started rationing. The government pushed war bonds and military production. Young men in large numbers signed up for military service at the expense of lucrative civilian careers.

There is at least one big flaw with this argument. Pearl Harbor didn't initiate the Crisis Turning, the 1929 and the stock market crash did. In other words, the US had been in a Crisis "mood" for over a decade at that point. Of course, in December 1941 there was a lot of Day of Infamy talk that happened to land in fertile soil. FDR must have felt greatly relieved the day the Japanese eventually struck and Hitler declared war, as up to that point there was a certain shortage of legit reasons to go to war with Germany.

In this Fourth Turning, the sequence of events was reversed, foreign first and domestic second, but as 9/11 hardly had the scope of Pearl Harbor, we shouldn't be surprised it wasn't as clearcut a watershed event. So instead of abruptly falling into it, after the initial shock the western world rather slid into a 4T mood over the following months and years, but arguably long before the 2008 financial crisis.

Also, as is well known, an argument could at least be made that in a similar way, after the 1929 stock market crash, America slid into the 4th Turning during the Hoover years.

I don't see why such a reasoning would be so hard to accept. Most great historical turning points are more like symbols while the actual casuality of events are smeared out across a wider span of time. But we still need the symbols to pin the narrative on something.

Our current 4th turning was also domestic first. The crash and Great Recession of 2008 is the exact repeat of the crash and Great Depression of 1929.

9-11 did not start a turning, and did not create anything more than taking us back to business as usual before the Berlin Wall fell. Americans were encouraged to go shopping in order to show the terrorists we were not cowards. 9-11 was compared to the Wall Street bombing of 1919 by S&H, and appropriately so. Terrorists were already the bane of the 3rd turning, and this continued. 

There was no 4T mood until we were on the verge of falling off a veritable financial cliff. Only lessons learned from the last crash saved us from an identical fate. The economic recession worldwide in 2008 and thereafter, along with climate change, drove the series of middle east and worldwide revolutionary outbreaks from 2011 to 2015, and this in turn created the immigration crisis that has spawned reactionary ethnic nationalism, Trump and Brexit. In this 4T, tyranny has made a comeback, and Russia again is a threat.

Meanwhile, reactionary movements in the USA, born in the 2T, have continued, and resistance to them is growing now. A confrontation looms, and the pendulum is swinging. The domestic conflict may erupt violently before this 4T is over in 2028-29. And we may face more war abroad when the war cycle comes around again too. I expect the year 2025 to see the outbreak of the crisis climax, and continuous build up to it until then.

In the double rhythm, our 4T is more domestic the foreign. We are recycling through the 1850s now, and 1861 looms ahead in 2025. Perhaps lessons learned will help make our cold civil war stay reasonably cold, just as our great depression only became a great recession because of lessons learned, and thus state intervention happened sooner to keep us from going entirely off the financial cliff.

Sure, you have your interpretation and I have mine. I also do not write from an exclusively American perspective. In my view the migration/globalist system crisis is the main crisis of this 4T. What is pinned against each other are two big ideas, nationalism (several dimensions, including economic, social and philosophical) vs. globalism (several dimensions, including economic, social and philosophical), and I just find it a curious coincidence that I began to take a deep interest in the reality of immigration in 1999 - a subject that previously had been swept under the rug, also by myself. To me personally, this was the point where my private 3T was exited and the 4T entered.

But I wasn't alone in this, and within the next five years, encapsulating 9/11 and the US initiating the wars of folly, it and related subjects became the main theme of political discussion and cultural discourse, coinciding with the mass spread of the internet. Not among the brainwashed and out of touch establishment of course, but among everybody else. A sense of urgency was engendered that had nothing to do with the placid 90's era Unraveling mood. The 2015 migration crisis was just a singular peak event in what for a long time had been conflict and confrontation business as usual, so the "reactionary ethnic nationalism" sure wasn't spawned by it, although one can hardly deny it further benefitted from it. The 4T has been going on for a long while now.

[Hintergrund]

The Boomers have most of the money and the power, but one day they're gonna die anyway, and they can't control people beyond the grave. We should remind them that they'll become the most hated generation ever if they don't clean their shit up. They're narcissists, but exactly for that reason they should be interested that people will remember them in a good way.

[Bill the Piper]

My answer to the OP question is NO.

The crisis is about democratic globalism having lost the hearts and minds of Western nations. Then two competitors arose to fight for its place: Obama-style progressivism and Trump-style identitarianism. It has nothing to do with 9/11 and the war on terror. It has a lot to do with the Lehman Brothers crash, followed by the euro-zone debt crisis. 2008 is the best date to start the 4T, but one could argue the civil war which broke out in Iraq in 2006 was a foretaste of the crisis (from the Western perspective, from the Iraqi perspective it was perhaps beginning of 3T chaos, while the rest of the Arab world had to wait until 2013 or so to see it). Neoconservatism became wildly unpopular in that year, and since military intervention is an important aspect of pro-market globalism. The war was not hugely unpopular in 2003-5 (outside intellectual circles), but after the civil war started, people started to agree with the anti-war types. Also, 2006 was the year nativism started to become popular in America, while in Europe it had to wait for the 2010s.

[pbrower2a]

(11-20-2018, 06:45 AM)Bill the Piper Wrote: My answer to the OP question is NO.

The crisis is about democratic globalism having lost the hearts and minds of Western nations. Then two competitors arose to fight for its place: Obama-style progressivism and Trump-style identitarianism. It has nothing to do with 9/11 and the war on terror. It has a lot to do with the Lehman Brothers crash, followed by the euro-zone debt crisis. 2008 is the best date to start the 4T, but one could argue the civil war which broke out in Iraq in 2006 was a foretaste of the crisis (from the Western perspective, from the Iraqi perspective it was perhaps beginning of 3T chaos, while the rest of the Arab world had to wait until 2013 or so to see it). Neoconservatism became wildly unpopular in that year, and since military intervention is an important aspect of pro-market globalism. The war was not hugely unpopular in 2003-5 (outside intellectual circles), but after the civil war started, people started to agree with the anti-war types. Also, 2006 was the year nativism started to become popular in America, while in Europe it had to wait for the 2010s.

It may be globalism, and it may have republican forms, but it is anything but democratic. The neo-liberal globalism had as its basis the idea that the economy was best run by and that politics were appropriately run by experts -- people of economic success, and not 'losers' like the rest of Humanity. Competition would cheapen everything, especially labor, bit monopolization and vertical integration would foster an economic order in which the Right People got whatever they needed to make things work especially well -- obviously for themselves alone.

Economic inequality creates stresses in its own right, and the more severe the economic inequality the greater the stresses are upon everything, including the economic institutions and the political structure.

A 3T has its portents of trouble, as with the anarchist and Bolshevik crazes circa 1920 and with the Crash of '21. The political system is still strong enough to patch things together., only to foster a speculative bubble that destroys itself. The financial panic at the end of a 3T (as in 1857, 1929, or 2008) is the worst in the lifetime of any but the oldest living persons.



Larger version from Wikipedia

Late-3T leadership is typically weak and permissive, and tells people to go ahead and initiate a new era of unprecedented and eternal prosperity based upon low taxes, easy money, and cheap labor. The last 3T leadership can no longer patch things together. As the bubble bursts, institutions, including government, are discredited. Then comes the 4T.

[beechnut79]

(11-20-2018, 10:00 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(11-20-2018, 06:45 AM)Bill the Piper Wrote: My answer to the OP question is NO.

The crisis is about democratic globalism having lost the hearts and minds of Western nations. Then two competitors arose to fight for its place: Obama-style progressivism and Trump-style identitarianism. It has nothing to do with 9/11 and the war on terror. It has a lot to do with the Lehman Brothers crash, followed by the euro-zone debt crisis. 2008 is the best date to start the 4T, but one could argue the civil war which broke out in Iraq in 2006 was a foretaste of the crisis (from the Western perspective, from the Iraqi perspective it was perhaps beginning of 3T chaos, while the rest of the Arab world had to wait until 2013 or so to see it). Neoconservatism became wildly unpopular in that year, and since military intervention is an important aspect of pro-market globalism. The war was not hugely unpopular in 2003-5 (outside intellectual circles), but after the civil war started, people started to agree with the anti-war types. Also, 2006 was the year nativism started to become popular in America, while in Europe it had to wait for the 2010s.

It may be globalism, and it may have republican forms, but it is anything but democratic. The neo-liberal globalism had as its basis the idea that the economy was best run by and that politics were appropriately run by experts -- people of economic success, and not 'losers' like the rest of Humanity. Competition would cheapen everything, especially labor, bit monopolization and vertical integration would foster an economic order in which the Right People got whatever they needed to make things work especially well -- obviously for themselves alone.

Economic inequality creates stresses in its own right, and the more severe the economic inequality the greater the stresses are upon everything, including the economic institutions and the political structure.

A 3T has its portents of trouble, as with the anarchist and Bolshevik crazes circa 1920 and with the Crash of '21. The political system is still strong enough to patch things together., only to foster a speculative bubble that destroys itself. The financial panic at the end of a 3T (as in 1857, 1929, or 2008) is the worst in the lifetime of any but the oldest living persons.



Larger version from Wikipedia

Late-3T leadership is typically weak and permissive, and tells people to go ahead and initiate a new era of unprecedented and eternal prosperity based upon low taxes, easy money, and cheap labor. The last 3T leadership can no longer patch things together. As the bubble bursts, institutions, including government, are discredited. Then comes the 4T.

They may be discredit but still are holding on to tremendous amounts of influence. What seems to be happening now ts that we may be feeling extra (in) sensitive and emotional as we are asked to dive deep into our waters. The jackpot questions are: What needs to be healed? What can re release? We may intuitvely know all these answers. It just takes courage to heed the call. So far few seem to have that courage, ala Rosa Parks when she refused to go to the back of the bus. Who will refuse to go to the back of the bus for the fascist establishment who has enough clout to be able to make a difference?

[Bill the Piper]

(11-20-2018, 10:00 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: It may be globalism, and it may have republican forms, but it is anything but democratic.

To make a distinction between a democracy and a republic is an idea which might come from Newspeak.

Quote:The neo-liberal globalism had as its basis the idea that the economy was best run by and that politics were appropriately run by experts -- people of economic success, and not 'losers' like the rest of Humanity.

If these experts and people of economic success are elected in free elections, it is democracy.

Quote:Late-3T leadership is typically weak and permissive, and tells people to go ahead and initiate a new era of unprecedented and eternal prosperity based upon low taxes, easy money, and cheap labor. The last 3T leadership can no longer patch things together. As the bubble bursts, institutions, including government, are discredited. Then comes the 4T.

IMO it was the hedonism promoted by pop culture that encouraged people to run up a debt.

[Ragnarök_62]

(11-20-2018, 02:32 PM)Bill the Piper Wrote:

(11-20-2018, 10:00 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: It may be globalism, and it may have republican forms, but it is anything but democratic.

To make a distinction between a democracy and a republic is an idea which might come from Newspeak.

Quote:The neo-liberal globalism had as its basis the idea that the economy was best run by and that politics were appropriately run by experts -- people of economic success, and not 'losers' like the rest of Humanity.

If these experts and people of economic success are elected in free elections, it is democracy.

Quote:Late-3T leadership is typically weak and permissive, and tells people to go ahead and initiate a new era of unprecedented and eternal prosperity based upon low taxes, easy money, and cheap labor. The last 3T leadership can no longer patch things together. As the bubble bursts, institutions, including government, are discredited. Then comes the 4T.

IMO it was the hedonism promoted by pop culture that encouraged people to run up a debt.

That's one way of looking at it. The above to me is the end result of following Neoliberal policies.

As such. Neoliberalism is the ideology behind the process of profit maximization in that it advocates open markets, open borders, and open financial institutions. People are both workers and consumers. Neoliberalism sees people as labor resources and consumers. So open borders = profit maximization by increasing the supply of labor, thus driving the cost down. Consumers are sought by open markets. This means that products are sold where the profit is maximized by crapification and then sold to consumers who can obtain the products by earnings or debt taken on which is enabled by open financial institutions. The gap between falling/stagnant wagers and profit leads to inequality. Inequality is a cause of social ills like homelessness, a tsunami of despair upon which heroin needles and empty liquor bottles grow. Inequality also leads to asset bubbles which in time pop. Collapsing asset prices screw up banks because the value of their collateral ruins their capital position. So, there you have it, Neoliberal people did this shit. It's all their fault, along with Neoconservatives, see below. Neoliberals are the top 1% along with their shills(mainstream media) and bought folks(congress,assorted regulators,POTUS,stink tanks, etc. ).

Neoconservatives:  This ideology is one where the US military is used as an instrument to punish countries that don't tow the line or have some resources the US wants to have. Iraq is where the policy was to blame Saddam for something he didn't do. He didn't have weapons of mass destruction, but the US invaded on false pretenses.  Neocons said the invasion was to promote democracy in Iraq. This is either a lie to get access to oil, or really dumb beliefs by people in high office. This and all other wars fought since 2001 are utter failures. The cost of these screwups is a really big number, in the trillions. This government debt, which is a big number is also a 4T concern.

[pbrower2a]

(11-20-2018, 02:32 PM)Bill the Piper Wrote:

(11-20-2018, 10:00 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: It may be globalism, and it may have republican forms, but it is anything but democratic.

To make a distinction between a democracy and a republic is an idea which might come from Newspeak.

Republican forms but some serious lack (lack of competition, free choice, or universal franchise... or preset results) indicate the absence of democracy.

Quote:

Quote:The neo-liberal globalism had as its basis the idea that the economy was best run by and that politics were appropriately run by experts -- people of economic success, and not 'losers' like the rest of Humanity.

If these experts and people of economic success are elected in free elections, it is democracy.

But will it stay a democracy?

Quote:

Quote:Late-3T leadership is typically weak and permissive, and tells people to go ahead and initiate a new era of unprecedented and eternal prosperity based upon low taxes, easy money, and cheap labor. The last 3T leadership can no longer patch things together. As the bubble bursts, institutions, including government, are discredited. Then comes the 4T.

IMO it was the hedonism promoted by pop culture that encouraged people to run up a debt.

But buying houses for insane prices also bloats the private debt.

Sackcloth and ashes do not sell except in classical music, the blues, and country. In classical music the sackcloth and ashes is catharsis. In the blues, it is the reality of oppression. In country it is usually a depiction of self-inflicted harm to one's life.

[Bill the Piper]

(11-21-2018, 01:18 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: Republican forms but some serious lack (lack of competition, free choice, or universal franchise... or preset results) indicate the absence of democracy.

Are you thinking of the lack of viable third party candidates in the US, restricting the choice to Republicans vs Democrats?
The UK, Canada, etc. don't have this problem. So do you consider them democratic?

Universal franchise has existed in the US and other Western countries for long time.

[pbrower2a]

(11-21-2018, 06:42 AM)Bill the Piper Wrote:

(11-21-2018, 01:18 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: Republican forms but some serious lack (lack of competition, free choice, or universal franchise... or preset results) indicate the absence of democracy.

Are you thinking of the lack of viable third party candidates in the US, restricting the choice to Republicans vs Democrats?
The UK, Canada, etc. don't have this problem. So do you consider them democratic?

Universal franchise has existed in the US and other Western countries for long time.

It is clear that we can discount that a political system that gets '100% of eligible voters to give 100% of their vote to the list of the Workers' Party of (North) Korea' is at all democratic. The word republic has been so cheapened to imply that the political order has no hereditary monarch, even if a figurehead. Canada, for example, does not call itself a republic.

A Presidential system like that of the United States favors a two-party system which makes alternatives less than viable.

Democracy is possible in a two-Party system so long as both Parties are committed to liberal democracy. If one Party is firmly democratic and the other is anti-democratic (typically a fascist, Communist, or theocratic Party), then democracy depends upon majorities for the democratic party. One party that has room for practically everyone? Think of South Africa today.

A democratic order in which the two most powerful Parties are a fascist party and a Communist Party -- think of Germany in 1932 -- is doomed. 

Less than universal franchise? South Africa under Apartheid.